Basketball and Beyond: Johnny Dawkins previews Sweet Sixteen

March 27, 2014

Five of Mike Krzyzewski’s former players are currently head coaches at NCAA Division I institutions. Johnny Dawkins is one of them.

Dawkins, who had a storied career as the point guard of the Blue Devils from 1982-1986 before playing nine seasons in the NBA, became the head coach at Stanford in 2008 after spending 10 seasons as Coach K’s assistant coach. In his first NCAA Tournament as head coach, Dawkins has led the Cardinal to the Sweet Sixteen.

Dawkins joined Coach K on Basketball and Beyond this week, and talked about his team’s success this season, despite having no true point guard.

“We’re a big team and that’s where our true strength lies,” Dawkins told Coach K. “So we’re playing a lot smaller in the backcourt.”

Stanford implimented a triangle offense, and Dawkins explained why the tactic works for his team specifically.

It affords you the opportunity to play big and you don’t need a true guard to run the system because the system would kind of run itself once the ball is entered. We really made a full commitment to just learn that system. We drill it quite a bit and you want it to become habit. They’re starting to realize the value of ball movement, ball reversals, limited dribbles … each kid has a strength, play to that strength. They’re doing that, and they’re getting the shots that they can make and that’s all you can ask for.

This week on Basketball and Beyond, Coach K also talked about the remaining teams in the tournament, and the strength of Florida.

Their guard play has been flawless; not good, flawless. What I like about [Scottie Wilbekin] is that he looks confident, he exudes confidence. in this tournament, the guy with the ball, first of all if he can perform at a high level, which he can, but if he looks at a high level, everybody else gets that energy and confidence from him.